Sports

SEEING COLORS


It's going to be the World Cup season soon (sooner than I can finish sneeze'ing' ..having flu today. (Can germs be transmitted through the net or through phone lines? Hmm..).



Well, this week let's post according to colors.. yes. Going to slot in the color themes as fast as I can because after these everyone will jam the net lines watching live and 'non live' telecasts of the World Cup. What's wrong with that? Well, nothing actually..only that the internet connection will be very sloooow... Can't people just watch the games at the 'mamak' stalls or cafes where there are big screens and fanatic fans screaming each time someone scores a goal.

Guess..it's really a big event: watching 2 teams fighting to get to kick a ball into the other team's goal. I am really not a sports fan. Anyone can see that.



If you think that the last Badminton Cup was bad, this is going to be worse. The tv even has the old refrain coming back : eat, sleep and dream FIFA World Cup (in Malay: Makan Bola, Tidur Bola dan minum Coca Cola') :p At the hotel, we are already in the midst of putting the final touches to the preparation for the World Cup. The posters are ready, the T-Shirts coming in, the sponsors are lined up, The 2 big LCD screens & speakers have been put up (imagine the sound/din it will make! Enough to wake up the dead!).

As the plans are still hush-hush matter (as good old boss was saying: We must keep the element of surprise to catch the competitors off guard!), I will only be able to show you the photos a few days before the actual event. :)



The FIFA World Cup 2010 will be held in South Africa. Countdown: 42 Days 9 hours 28 minutes and 10 seconds before the kick offs (11 June- 11 July 2010). :p (grin) We were all told to memorize this basic info. Sigh.. It will be a very busy month as the hotel is going to be full with Church groups and holiday vacationers (Singaporeans starts their school holiday from 28th May till 20 June 2010).

Malaysians will be joining in the fun as ours will start a week after that 5th June till 20th June 2010. Never mind, I got used already to the weird schedule... :) hoteliers work while everyone is enjoying the holidays.



Voila! That's the plan for month of May & June. Come what may, need to finish everything before next week before the hectic period starts. The World Cup 2010 song is not bad at all. Got a catchy tune to it. :p

Watch all the excitement of pre-FiFA at www.fifa.com/worldcup


Signing off,
Hana

********
AFTER WORLD CUP

Finally, the World Cup fever is finished :).
In conclusion, I now know that :
1) Spain is the winner :p (grin)
2) The last match was Spain vs Netherlands... :p
2) There was a story about a giant squid..oppss..Octopus.. named Paul:p
3) Also a story about a bird making predictions.. (lol)
4) Something about referees being sent home
5) Special menus created with weird names
6) Football players in Malaysian ads :)
Guess.. that's the whole lot of it.

Phew..That's one big event cat is glad it's finished and can now be slot into my filing cabinet. Feeling so out of place this 1 month.. :p where the conversation and attention was all on the World Cup. (Understandable that it's not every day that you get to watch the big event.. but still, I did get the feeling of being left out). I tried to keep track of the names of the players, the scores, the jersey numbers..alas, it's not easy when your mind keeps wandering to other things.. :)

Now that the football fever has gone, let's do a bit of post mortem. From my window, I would say that the winners are the restaurant owners, the mamak shops, Mc Donald's (who came out with all those special football snacks) and all the big hotels. The main attraction everywhere is places where there's big LCD screens and food.

It sounds easy to just mix and match some recipes based on the countries that's playing and put the names of the players on them. In reality, it's complicated. There's meeting almost everyday as we need to be more creative and faster than the competitors. How to attract crowd and get as much business in while the game is on. On our side, we have put 2 big LCD screen at our open air cafe..with 2 games going on simultaneously, and a big score board updated daily.

We decided not to create new dishes but to work with what we have on our hands: Marketing and Re-branding our top selling products. It does seems like I am boasting and talking too much on technicality this time... doesn't it? Please excuse me.. well..I am just pleased to be a part of the project and when it works..you would just want to share it with others. :)

One of the things we did (it was rather boss's idea :) ) was put flags of each team's countries on our nasi lemak cover. It was great! If you have 4 person sitting at a table and 3 of them order the nasi lemak and each supported different teams, you have colorful packages on the table. The person who ordered other item than the nasi lemak, will have a flag of his team put on the plate. Put them on the plain dark tablecloth, it looks fantastic. We did have a bit of a problem before we could get the nasi lemak idea on. There were a bit of a delay as some people with higher authority was against the idea. They say that it's not ethical to put country flags on food packaging as these will be thrown into dustbins later on. We had a debate and presented our reasons (it was only a few days before the big game). Luckily, we won :p

The not so good scenario: There was lots of betting going on. And looking at the crowd, it was not small amount that change hands. More than cat's salary for 6 months. There were lots of drunken guests..they must have lost quite a lot. There was a room that was spoilt..as the guest threw up all over the bed, on the carpet and all over himself.. It was a wonder that he was still alive..after a night lying in his own vomit. The maid who did the room was almost in tears as she cannot stand the smell.

Well, that's a bit of my part in this whole World Cup issue. Tired to the bones..but happy to see that it worked out fine and there's a whisper that there's going to be a big bonus for us.. :) Hope the rumors are true. :)

Hmm.. wonder if I should make a book and sell it to the producers of 'Hotel Mania'. :p hehehe... just joking.